This will be dark. You have been warned.

"Text" = Speech

"Text" = Hand Signs or Sign Language

'Text' = Thoughts

Text = Onomatopoeia


Chapter 12: The Cost of Truth

September 30th, 2568

13:00 Local Time

Fort Keyes, Minerva, Lambda Rho System

The members of Fireteam Phoenix were halfway across the base when Arrin had caught up to them. The first thing she noticed was the handgun Andrew was clenching. Then was his face, a blood-stained grimace. Green glass was still embedded in his skin. "Andrew! What the hell happened out there? Are you okay? What are you four doing?" Andrew wasn't even looking at her when he responded.

"Stay outta the way Doc. I've got work to do." The Spartan kept moving, he wouldn't let that bastard slip away. Spook or not, justice would befall the man who'd wronged so many innocent soldiers. Arrin grabbed hold of his arm, her eyes pleading that he just speak. That he didn't regress back to the silent machine that she had met all those years ago. Sylas growled at her. "Sylas, tritt zurück," the dog looked between his handler and the woman before lowering his head and keeping pace with the group. Andrew pulled his arm from Arrin's grip and kept on his way. Thermer pulled her aside to talk.

"Look, now is probably the worst time to try and keep him grounded. We just lost eight soldiers in an ambush, he damn near lost a fight with a Sangheili sword master and he knows exactly who coordinated the attack. We need him pissed off," Thermer's voice was tense. His body ached from the explosion that sent him tumbling earlier. He depolarized his visor and locked eyes with Arrin. "Look, we're taking the bastard into custody and then transferring to a blacksite before sun up tomorrow. Whether he's backed by the military or not, he was gonna do this. This is what he wants, and if anyone stands in his way, he'll kill them."

"So what, are you just going to indulge the monster he already believes he is? You're just going to let him do every horrible thing ONI taught him? For what? Justice? Retribution? You're letting him lose so much progress!" Arrin couldn't wrap her head around why they'd let him do this. What drove them to let Andrew go off the reservation. Her distress was put to rest when the man in question spoke. "This man has the blood of the innocent on his hands. He brought terrorists into a civilian zone and let them wreak havoc. This man has the blood of fifty-three dead men and five injured on his hands. He deserves a fate worse than what I'll give him. Sometimes to hunt a monster one must take on properties of their prey. I'm putting an end to the bloodshed he's causing. Get in our way and I'll be seeking a new doc, clear?"

Arrin stared on as the group carried on their way. The shock of Andrew's final statement still settling, she couldn't do much more than open and close her mouth like a fish.


13:04

Fort Keyes O.N.I. Building

Two MPs stepped aside as Phoenix entered the obsidian building. O.N.I. had built a motif of darkness and mystery around themselves, but even the four of them found that the Office could be rather on the nose with it. Two more MPs greeted the Spartans inside, "Fireteam Phoenix, we'll be escorting you to Agent Henshaw. Right this way." They were led to a bank of elevators and the group split in two in order to fit everyone. Still the elevators were cramped, Spartans in full MJOLNIR could easily be up to two and a half times the size of a normal human.

The groups stepped out of the elevators onto the fifth floor and reconvened before turning down a long corridor. The MPs were noticeably uncomfortable with the team's silence. Only the sounds of shifting armor, footsteps and Sylas' nails on the smooth granite floor could be heard. They stopped at a door halfway down the corridor. "Henshaw is just inside. I believe he's overseeing an operation right now." Andrew nodded and the MPs turned away.

All but Andrew stacked up at the door, he stood right in front of it as it slid open. Raising Bunsen and pointing the scarred pistol straight at Henshaw's chest, he stepped into the Ops Center. The agent didn't even acknowledge that the door had opened. "Clayton Henshaw, you are hereby under military arrest. Your crimes include theft of military property, black market distribution of said military property, espionage, and aiding and abetting terrorists. Put your hands behind your head now. You will receive a lawyer and trial before a military tribunal." Henshaw stepped away from the command table and complied with Andrew's orders. Thermer patted the disgraced analyst down and cuffed him. King stepped up and stripped Henshaw of his rank.

"How's the party in New Sydney?" Henshaw didn't see the punch coming. Sam's blow sent the man to the floor in a heap. The silence was unbearable. The other agents in the room looked around confusedly, unsure of what to do next. Their silent question was answered by Andrew. "Pull the plug on your op. Whatever Henshaw had you doing, pull it. Your ground team is in danger. Henshaw's been in bed with the innies for a while now. Get those troops out."


October 1st, 2568

09:30 Local Time

O.N.I. Blacksite, Designation: Foxhole

Henshaw's eyes tried desperately to adjust as the canvas bag was pulled off his head. The blinding white lights seared after hours of darkness. As his brain frantically tried to pull his senses together a seemingly distant voice called out to him. His left cheek welled with pain and the room finally came into focus. It was dull grey with two doors on opposite ends. He was placed in the middle of the room atop the only chair. Near one door was a table cluttered with what seemed like random tools and objects. The voice spoke his name again. "Henshaw."

Andrew stood nearby. His cuts had been stitched and bandaged closed. Despite the signs that the Spartan wasn't immortal, the visage of the damage and his steely gaze made the man that much more intimidating. "Welcome to your new home, Clayton. You'll be spending the rest of your life in two rooms. This is the interrogation room, the other is your cell. It's time to face the music and own up. I'll be back in a moment." Andrew walked through the door by the table. Henshaw looked around at his surroundings again. Underneath his chair was a small drain in the floor. Near the door to what was presumably his cell was an observation window. Through it he could a room painted in plain white and furnished likewise. There was a toilet and shower stall in one corner, against a wall was a bed, and in the middle of the room a desk and chair.

Andrew reentered the room with King in tow. The two set up a small desk with video communication equipment right in front of Henshaw. Once it was ready, King opened a line and waited. Serin Osman appeared on the screen. She looked over the disgraced analyst contempt was painted across her face. Andrew walked up to Henshaw's chair and rested a hand on the back of it. "Admiral, nice of you to join us this morning. We were just explaining to Clayton that this would be one of two rooms where he'd spend the rest of his life."

"Cut the shit Andrew. Let's talk shop, I'm going to presume that this will go in your file of missing records. First, I want to know whether or not you're going to hold this over the Office's head like you normally do. Secondly, you have my permission to do anything you need to get intel out of him, after which I want you to kill him. Make that part painful."

"Look Osman, can I call you that? Doesn't matter, here's the short and skinny of it. Everything your Office has me do goes in the burnt records. All of it. However, this one is free. Clayton here tried to get me killed three times. Clayton turned a city into a fucking warzone. Clayton is gonna suffer before I kill him. Now, I think he needs to know what happened once his friends got to work yesterday." The video feed split in two. Osman on one side, and the news feed from New Sydney on the other. The aerial view showed smoke rising from the streets all across the city. Civilian recordings depicted car bombs and rockets, police and Army pushing back the tide of insurrection forces. Then the attack on the parade. The trucks slamming into each other. The fuel cells exploding. It ended on the only hopeful note, Phoenix reuniting the woman with her son.

Henshaw had been completely silent throughout. His eyes were wide with shock and his jaw slack. He hung his head low. This was far more damage than they were supposed to cause. This was too much. They weren't even the people they claimed to be. "They told me they were Keepers when I made contact with them. They were only supposed to target you, police precincts and recruitment offices."

"That's all fine and dandy Henshaw, but they ain't fucking Keepers of the One Truth! You brought the 'Verse damned Red Hand into the most densely populated area on the planet! Eight soldiers dead. Five more injured. Fifty-seven police officers dead, twenty three in critical condition. Over one hundred civilians either dead or missing. This is all on you," Andrew was centimeters away from Henshaw's face. His bright green eyes bored into Clayton's pale blue. "So tell me, why'd ya do it?"

Clayton didn't speak. He sat silent for a few minutes before Andrew straighten out and turned his attention to King. They whispered something and King went to the table. "Hammond, playback King's helmet footage. Start three seconds before he meets the child. Clayton, I want you to pay attention to this. Then I'll ask you again."

The video feed split once more, this time playing from King's perspective. It played from when King noticed the blip on his motion tracker until he put the child in the VIP vehicle. The kid's sobbing filled the otherwise silent room. It skipped to when Brandon retrieved the child and played until the two ran to the cafe. Andrew asked his question again and was met with silence. After a minute he looked at Osman and then at King. "Well bud, I guess it's time to put up the mask of the noble man. Do me a favor and break his left shin with that bat. Nothing with bone jutting out though."

"Happy to oblige," King took up the bat and spun it in one hand. Getting a feel for its weight and balance the irate Spartan sauntered over to Henshaw. In one swift motion he cracked Clayton across the shin. The man howled in pain. All of the air in his lungs left and he panted heavily to catch his breath. Andrew untied the leg from the chair and put an auto-splint around it. The device pump air into itself until the broken limb was held firmly between the metal plates on its inner circumference.

"If you don't want to talk, we're just gonna keep hurting you. Mentally or physically it doesn't matter. You'll crack eventually. I've got a feeling that's all from you for today though. Hammond, keep the news of the attacks playing in his cell. I want him to know the depth of his sin." The dumb AI complied and the Spartans tossed Clayton into his cell.

"You want to fill me in on why you broke his leg?"

"I don't want him to have hope of escaping, Osman. I want him to feel helpless. I want him to be easy to manipulate. To break a man is to crush his spirit. What better way than to strip him of hope?"

"You don't find that a bit excessive?"

"I've done worse before asking anything. We'll see you in a couple of days when we try again. Until then he's on solitary." Andrew cut the comm-link. King walked over and grabbed Andrew by the collar.

"What makes you think you have the right to do that?"

"I needed you in a state of mind where you'd do anything to the man responsible for what we dealt with. I needed him to understand just what he'd done," Andrew pried King's hand away. "You all agreed to come help me with this. If you don't like it then you can go back to base and wait for the rest of us. I never said it was gonna be a walk in the park. Do I make myself clear?"

"Crystal."


October 5th, 2568

Andrew dreaded the conversation to come. He always dreaded that talk. He had been notified the day before that one of widows of the Vanguard team wanted to speak with him. He sat in front of the comms terminal anxiously. As the call connected Andrew prepared for the same thing he'd seen time and time again. A bleary-eyed woman who'd been crying. Streaked make-up and bedraggled hair. What he saw when the image came through wasn't what he'd expected. She wore no make-up, her hair was kempt and her glare was hateful.

Her voice came through clear as day. There was an unsettling calm to it, as though every word was meticulously laid out in her mind. She didn't falter. She didn't waver. She spoke with measured breath, "Did he suffer? Did he feel what happened to him?"

"No ma'am. Not as far as I know. If you'd like I can tell you everything that happened up to your husband's death," she nodded at him and the Spartan spoke again. "Your husband was part of a unit designated Vanguard One. Their task was to drive the lead vehicle in a small political parade. Nothing was supposed to happen as we went from New Sydney's Capitol building to a local space port that had been cordoned off and reserved for a Sangheili diplomat. First Sergeant Sangrove's vehicle entered the intersection of 1st and 43rd. A box truck coming down 43rd slammed through the barricades and crashed in Sangrove's vehicle. No civilians were harmed but all of Vanguard One were unconscious.

"We set a defensive perimeter around the VIP. A man brandishing a rifle jumped from the box truck and was immediately killed by Spartan Thermer, my team leader. I was given orders to open fire on the box truck and complied. I reloaded and gave Vanguard Two orders to check on Vanguard One. Once the team was confirmed to be alive, I ordered Two to remove them from the wreckage and get to safety. As soon as the words left my mouth I heard a characteristic Thunk sound. Before I could tell them to get out of there, a forty-millimeter grenade bounced off the asphalt and detonated the fuel cells on Vanguard One's vehicle. The explosion chained to the box truck. They all died in the explosion. I'm sorry I couldn't bring Sangrove home safely."

"Sorry won't bring him back."

"No, it won't. It won't bring back any of the people I've failed to bring home. It won't make these conversations any easier. It won't ease the guilt. I gave an order that got more people killed. I'm not sure if their lives were well spent or wasted in doing so. That's the burden of leadership."

"You say 'these conversations' like you've had to do this before."

"More times than I can count."

"Why do you accept the calls?"

"Widows and widowers deserve some sense of closure."

"Isn't there anyone else who can take them."

"Not when you want to speak with the one in charge when they died."

"I see. Thank you, Spartan. I think that's all I need. Good bye."


October 8th, 2568

"C'mon Henshaw just tell us how to contact them." Andrew removed the rag from the man's face and let him catch his breath. So far, the man hadn't been very compliant with questioning.

"I told you I don't fucking remember!" Andrew nodded to Thermer who jabbed Clayton with a cattle prod. Electricity arced across the man's drenched body. As soon as Thermer stopped, the rag went right back over Clayton's mouth and more water was poured over his face. For good measure Andrew knocked the wind out of the man and waited for a moment.

"I don't know. For the love of God, I don't know." Andrew unstrapped him from the table and let him stand up. The Spartan grabbed a towel and tossed it to the man.

"Strip down and dry off. Then take a seat in the chair. Thermer, secure him once he's in it. I need to go grab something." Andrew went back upstairs and came down a moment later with a fuel can. Henshaw was strapped down and waiting. Andrew drenched the man in fuel and went to the table near the door.

"We're going to try this again. You tell me how we get in touch with your innie contact and you get to live. Thermer, you're dismissed." The Spartan turned around holding an incendiary grenade.

"Excuse me Spartan?" Osman sounded both confused and irritated.

"I don't want to waste my time with a useless subject."

"I don't know! Admiral, you can't let him do this!" Andrew set the timer on the grenade to ten seconds. He pulled the pin and set it under the chair. Andrew left the room and waited just outside the door, leaving it ajar as to hear the man's desperate pleas. With three seconds left to a fiery death Henshaw screamed out.

"You don't find him! He finds you! I used the chatter net to find local innies!" The grenade never went off. Andrew stepped back into the room and picked the grenade up. Henshaw's eyes were as wide as dinner plates as the Spartan unstrapped him.

"There's a reason I keep duds. Thank you for your cooperation. Go take a shower."

Henshaw ran into his cell and immediately went to the shower. Meanwhile the Admiral was staring Andrew down.

"Mind explaining that to me?"

"Fear is an excellent motivator when it comes to telling the truth. Especially the fear of death."

"He's not going to fall for that twice."

"I don't need him to. I have other methods."

"I'm not sure I like what that implies."

"Nobody ever does. Goodnight, Admiral. Don't let the skeletons in the closet scare you too much."


October 12th, 2568

Andrew sat in the common room of the blacksite waiting for Sam and King to return from patrol. The elevator for the bunker chimed as it came down to their level. The two entered the room and set their weapons on the rack by the door. Their jackets were the next to be set aside.

"Hey, I need you two to stay here. We need to have a team chat."

"Alright," Sam affirmed as the two sat down across from him. Thermer entered the room and sat down with Sam and King.

"It's come to my attention that two of you don't like my methods. King, Thermer, you've both made it clear in your own ways that you don't like this. I never said that this would be easy to do. I never said that what I do is morally just. You were the ones that said we needed me to be this. That we needed me to cross that thin grey line. I agree. This needed to happen. I needed to be the one to get answers.

"You asked to help me. You volunteered to come here. You wanted to learn what I do. I use anger and fear, isolation, sensory deprivation and over stimulation to break people down and give me the answers I want. It isn't what you thought it would be. That's fine. But here's where I draw a line. You don't get you show that around him. If you can't stand it, pack your shit and go back to Fort Keyes. You don't address what happens in that room. This is the cost of truth. You sacrifice a part of yourself for this."

"You used that kid to make me pissed enough to break his leg. You didn't even ask him anything. That's what you call acceptable?"

"First, I did ask him something. Second, no. I call it a necessary evil."

"You doused him in fuel and made him think he'd die in a hole. Was that necessary?"

"It got results. I've already got a few hits on chatter net."

"That's all you have to say on it? What the hell happened to you? You always talk about how you hated doing this. You try to keep physical damage to a minimum in the field and now you don't even seem to care. Just who the hell do you think you are," Thermer exclaimed.

"Arrin warned us about this," Sam spoke up. "She told you he could regress. You should be happy he's even considering your feelings and giving you an out."

"Thank you, Sam. He's right. This is how I was before the team. Before the meds. Before therapy. You've got an out. Request me transferred off the team if you want. Otherwise, deal with it."


October 20th, 2568

Andrew leaned on the wall waiting for Henshaw to look at him. Osman was growing impatient.

"Can we just start already? I have other business to attend to."

"Sure. Let's see here. We've addressed that he made contact with them through chatter net. He redirected our supply vessels under the guise of a special operation. He used his clearance to help them move weapons into New Sydney. The only question left is why."

Henshaw looked up at the two. The last two weeks had been utter hell. He understood why the Spartan had his reputation. The cuts and chemical burns that littered his body ached. The recent white noise treatment had nearly pushed him over the edge. He was about to speak when Andrew began to answer his own question.

"Judging from the holostills we found in your quarters, you wanted revenge for what happened on New Harmony. You had family in that cell. You wanted to do what we did to them. Destroy us from the inside out. Didn't you?"

"Yes. My uncle was the commander."

"I bet you wanted to be just like him some day. A big, strong man who stood up to the system?"

"Yes."

"Your uncle wasn't as strong or smart as you think."

"What do you know about him?"

"I know that he died, begging on his knees. I know that he didn't have the brain to look into the one man he was suspicious of."

Henshaw glared at Andrew in defiant silence.

"You know my nickname? Let me tell you how I got it. My first assignment was to infiltrate a rebel cell and tear it down from the inside out. The leader didn't trust me and called me a viper in the grass. Do you know what type of venom vipers use?"

"Hemotoxins."

"Very good. Most people don't get that right. I even lie about it to see if people know the truth. Anyway, hemotoxins destroy blood cells and spread necrosis through the body. It's a slow, agonizing process and that's exactly what I did. I poisoned their minds, destroyed their structure from the inside. That cell rotted away and when the time came, the UNSC swallowed them whole. I kept the nickname. It suited me."

"What does that have to do with my uncle?"

"He gave it to me. He died, begging me to spare him. Arrest him. Anything but take the shot. I pulled the trigger without a second thought."

"Spartan, I think you've had enough fun. When you're ready, you know what to do."

"Aye aye Admiral."


October 22nd, 2568

Andrew's leather jacket did little to block the late fall chill. It wasn't that the Sherpa lining wasn't warm, just that the wind blew through everything. Henshaw stood in front of him. An empty shallow grave sat behind the traitor.

"So, this is it? The end of the line?"

"Yup."

"Let's get this over then."

"It won't be quick. Don't be so eager to start."

Andrew pulled his handgun from the holster under his jacket. The scarred weapon was more menacing than Henshaw remembered. He didn't feel the round hit. Just the searing pain after as the incendiary round cauterized his wound. Clayton dropped to his knees, unable to cry out in pain. Andrew kneeled in front of him. He didn't know when the Spartan pulled the knife from its sheath, only that it was dangerously close to his solar plexus. Then there was the piercing. His chest froze up. He couldn't breathe anymore. Panic set in.

"This is the hardest part. The waiting. Don't worry it won't last long. I won't make you suffer too long."

The Spartan stood back up and waited for a minute. It was the longest minute of Henshaw's life. Andrew kept firing until the man fell back into the grave. He spent the next hour burying Henshaw. This wasn't what he planned on doing for his birthday.


Translations:

Sylas, tritt zurück = Sylas, stand down.

Notes:

So yeah, this got pretty dark. Next chapter will be a little lighter in tone. Andrew's investigation isn't over quite yet, but I think the crew deserves a little R&R first.